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Donaghy Cites Broad Misconduct in N.B.A.

LOS ANGELES — N.B.A. executives and referees are accused of broad misconduct and outright manipulation of game results — including a highly disputed 2002 playoff series — in the latest court filing by the lawyer for the former referee Tim Donaghy.

The charges, outlined by the lawyer John Lauro in a letter filed Tuesday, are the most detailed and the most provocative to emerge since last July, when Donaghy was arrested and charged with conspiring with gamblers. Donaghy has pleaded guilty and will be sentenced next month.

The accusations are contained in a four-page letter, sent to United States District Judge Carol B. Amon, as part of Donaghy’s plea for a lighter sentence. All of the information revealed Tuesday was previously conveyed by Donaghy to federal investigators last July. No one else has been charged with a crime.

Commissioner David Stern, speaking before Game 3 of the N.B.A. finals at Staples Center on Tuesday, dismissed all of the allegations as “baseless.”

According to Donaghy, N.B.A. executives directed referees “to manipulate games” in order to “boost ticket sales and television ratings,” and he cited several examples. Although the team names were withheld, Donaghy pointed to Game 6 of the 2002 Western Conference finals as one such instance.

The Los Angeles Lakers shot 40 free throws in that game — 27 in the fourth quarter — and beat Sacramento, 106-102, forcing a seventh game. The Lakers went on to win the series and beat the Nets for their third straight N.B.A. title.

The letter describes a 2002 playoff series that went seven games; the Western Conference finals was the only series to require seven games.

According to Lauro’s letter: “Tim learned from Referee A that Referees A and F wanted to extend the series to seven games. Tim knew Referees A and F to be ‘company men,’ always acting in the interest of the N.B.A., and that night, it was in the N.B.A.’s interest to add another game to the series.” The game was refereed by three tenured veterans, Dick Bavetta, Ted Bernhardt and Bob Delaney.

The Kings, their fans and many in the news media were outraged by the officiating that night. Ralph Nader, the consumer advocate, weighed in, urging Stern to conduct a review.

Stern did not respond to specific allegations but said that the N.B.A. had fully cooperated with the government since last summer.

“He turned on basically all of his colleagues in an attempt to demonstrate that he is not the only one who engaged in criminal activity,” Stern said. “The U.S. attorney’s office, the F.B.I. have fully investigated it, and Mr. Donaghy is the only one who is guilty of a crime. And he’s going to be sentenced for that crime, regardless of these desperate attempts to implicate as many people as he can.”

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Lamell McMorris, the spokesman for the N.B.A. referees union, also dismissed the allegations. “Tim Donaghy has had honesty and credibility issues from the get-go,” he said in a statement. He added, “He may be willing to say anything to help his cause and he may believe these most recent allegations will help his agenda.”

In their letter, Lauro and Donaghy made a number of other charges, among them:

¶That referees “socialized frequently with coaches and players” and asked for autographs and free merchandise, violating league rules.

¶That a referee’s relationship with one team’s general manager “led to an attempt by that referee to influence a game’s outcome” in 2004. Donaghy claimed that the referee in question told him that he planned to favor the general manager’s team in a game that night.

¶That N.B.A. officials instructed referees not to call technical fouls on “certain star players,” because it might hurt television ratings and ticket sales. Donaghy claims that in January 2000, a referee ejected a star player in the first quarter of a game and “later was reprimanded privately by the league.”

Lauro and Donaghy also cited a well-publicized controversy involving a 2005 playoff series between the Houston Rockets and Dallas Mavericks. Jeff Van Gundy, then the Rockets’ coach, was fined $100,000 after saying that an N.B.A. official had told him that Rockets center Yao Ming would be singled out for setting illegal screens.

“The referees followed the league instructions and Team 3 came back from behind to win the series,” the letter said. “The N.B.A. benefited from this, because it prolonged the series, resulting in more tickets sold and more televised games.”

Donaghy is scheduled to be sentenced July 14. He could face up to 25 years in prison and a $500,000 fine, but is expected to receive a lighter sentence because he cooperated with the authorities. Lauro and federal prosecutors filed letters last month urging the court to consider that cooperation. In his most recent letter, Lauro stated he was providing the new details because prosecutors failed to provide all of the relevant information in their filing.

In a separate matter, Lauro is requesting a subpoena to obtain results of the N.B.A.’s internal investigation regarding Donaghy and other referees. In a second letter filed Tuesday, Lauro said that the league was asking for $1 million in restitution from Donaghy, presumably to cover the costs of its internal review. Lauro argued that the N.B.A. must provide all of its documentation to justify the restitution claim.

The N.B.A. has yet to publicize the results of its review, which was conducted by an outside lawyer, Lawrence B. Pedowitz. Stern has said the report will be made public after Donaghy’s sentencing.

Correction: June 12, 2008

Because of an editing error, an article on May 2, 2005, about the suggestion by Jeff Van Gundy, the coach of the Houston Rockets at the time, that fouls were being called more readily and unfairly on his team’s center, Yao Ming, during the N.B.A. playoffs referred incorrectly to the genesis of Van Gundy’s concern. He said it was “an official”  not a referee  who had called him to say that Yao was being singled out in games against the Dallas Mavericks. Van Gundy was fined $100,000 by the league for his comments.

The error was repeated in a follow-up article in 2005 and again on Wednesday in an article about Tim Donaghy, a former referee who has pleaded guilty after being charged last year with conspiring with gamblers. In a court filing to seek leniency at sentencing, Donaghy and his lawyer cited the Van Gundy controversy among accusations of misconduct and manipulation of game results by N.B.A. executives and referees. Discussing the Donaghy case on a broadcast on Wednesday night, Van Gundy, now a television analyst, said he had been called by an N.B.A. official in 2005.